Sake has changed a lot in recent years and is often served cool or slightly chilled. There is a wide variety of Sake available and some are fairly dry and really excellent. Reserved warming for the the bargain basement variety as it takes the rough edges off.

Here's a helpful website about cooking with sake and the many varieties available.

If you are going to warm sake, be cautious not to overheat as the alcohol will evaporate easily. It shoudl not be hot but only warm. Aim for between 112 and 120 degrees. Typically you would put the sake in a small decanters and heat it in a pan of warm water (warm water bath). Then dry the decanter and pour into warmed cups.

Actually, most Japanese restaurants I've been to nuke it. One place in Dubuque has a specific sake warmer that I guess keeps it at just the right temp if you order it warm (in the summer I go for slightly more expensive and order it chilled). At home I've always nuked it. I don't have a sake set any more, but if yours is of a ceramic type where the ceramic gets too hot to handle, heat it in a pyrex-type measuring cup, then pour it into your decanter.

Sake has changed a lot in recent years and is often served cool or slightly chilled. There is a wide variety of Sake available and some are fairly dry and really excellent. Reserved warming for the the bargain basement variety as it takes the rough edges off.

Here's a helpful website about cooking with sake and the many varieties available.

If you are going to warm sake, be cautious not to overheat as the alcohol will evaporate easily. It shoudl not be hot but only warm. Aim for between 112 and 120 degrees. Typically you would put the sake in a small decanters and heat it in a pan of warm water (warm water bath). Then dry the decanter and pour into warmed cups.

Interesting; my experience with most spirits has been that chilling masks some of the drinks' flavors.

This topic brings me fond memories of drinking hot saki with friends at Japanese restaurants long ago. These days fewer of my friends like Japanese food and fewer of them drink at all.

I understand the custom of heating up saki began as a way to make poor saki more palatable. However I think it's worth doing with any saki because I like the experience and the taste, and I agree with the others that the warmed saki gets absorbed into your blood much more quickly and has more effect than cold wine. What's nice is that the feeling evaporates quickly too because it's not that much alcohol. You can be buzzing by the time dinner is served, but relatively sober by the time you've finished your meal.

I think it's just fine to nuke your saki as long as you don't get carried away. The temperature guidelines mentioned above in the topic seem perfectly reasonable to me.

Sake bars are trendy and groceries are carrying more variety, including unfiltered first presses.

The longtime Ozeki brand (the title given to a champion sumo wrestler) makes single-portion glass bottles in the narrow-necked decanter shape, capped with a plastic hot shot cup. A warm shot, for me, is a satisfying end to a meal; feels like a cleansing flush of my esophagus and stomach.